Linear Acoustic Mixes up NBC Olympic Coverage

June 11, 2008

Linear Acoustic has won an order for more than 30 UPMAX:neo upmixers from NBC. The upmixers will be deployed during NBC's coverage of the Beijing Olympics in August.

As part of its all-HD coverage of the Olympics, NBC is including prerecorded/edited programmes. In the event that the editing and recording equipment used doesn't have enough channels to support 5.1 surround sound, the UPMAX:neos will provide the upmixing capability needed to maintain sound quality throughout.

"NBC is breaking new ground with its comprehensive HD coverage of the Beijing Olympics, and the network's ability to provide high-quality sound will be key to the delivery of the Games in all their glory," said Tim Carroll, president, Linear Acoustic.

The Linear Acoustic UPMAX:neo system will be in use at virtually every Olympics venue involved in live broadcasting and at the NBC Olympics broadcast centre in audio control rooms, edit rooms, and in the quality control area as a monitoring and troubleshooting tool.

It will allow audio engineers to analyze the quality of incoming stereo feeds, whether for stereo broadcasts or for upmixing to 5.1 audio. The UPMAX:neo will also downmix audio, yielding stereo sound comparable to the stereo audio originally fed into the system.